Philippines Panel Assigns FOI Bill to Working Group

25 October 2013

The Philippines House Public Information Committee Oct. 23 formed a technical working group to consolidate the 19 different freedom of the information bills before it.

Committee Chairman Jorge Almonte wants to rename the legislation “access to information,” a proposal that has generated some negative reaction, according to a report in The Inquirer and another in Rappler.

How to handle the bills was discussed during the first organizational meeting of the committee.

Almonte will chair the working group but no members were appointed or future meeting time set.

The FOI legislation in the past several years has failed to pass in the House after winning Senate approval. A Senate vote has likely been delayed until next year. (See previous FreedomInfo.org report.)